Writer, dreamer, adventurer

The power of dreams

For the title of my page I have written my name: Juniper Shaw along with three words. Writer, dreamer, adventurer. They describe me, not only the me that I am but the me that I want to be.

When I was a child I would read, there was hardly a time you would find me without a book in my hand or under my pillow or in my pocket, to carry a book with me was probably the only reason I ever carried a handbag. Some might call it an obsession but I prefer the word passion. I had a passion for the written word, I devoured it all, the far away places, adventures and noble characters. Having a vivid imagination books could bring me to places and emotions and worlds in a way that movies and TV never could. As I grew the passion for reading and stories naturally evolved to day dreaming, imagining my own stories and the trying to catch them with words.

As a teenager, you would find me in my classes scribbling stories and poems, day dreaming of the day I would become a world famous writer. Then as adulthood loomed, reality reared its ugly head and sneezed disgusting goop all over my rosy fantasy’s.

But reality can not change who you are inside. So those moments, the ones were I wasn’t working or doing all those annoying things adults have to do, I would day dream my stories and I would write. I came to realise it’s all about baby steps. Just keep moving forward. It has taken time, more time than I want to think about. It has taken energy, frustration, terror and tears, but, I did it. The thing that in my heart of hearts I never thought I would accomplish. I wrote and published a short story.

Today, Thursday 11th May 2017, is the launch of my very first Short story. Fat Girl Hiking.

YAY! WOOOHOOO! YIPIEE! EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKK!

I know I am not world famous, and its not a full sized novel which will change the world. But its mine, I wrote it and this is just the beginning.

What is my story about about I hear you ask?

‘I might have the neurosis of a writer, the body of a Buddha and the fitness of an asthmatic elephant but I have the soul of an adventurer.’

When 24 year old, English girl Piper agrees to go on a 6-day mountain hike in the middle of summer in South Africa she forgets to take one thing into consideration: she’s fat. Fat and unfit. Join her journey as you read this brutally honest account of the ups, downs, and hilarity of being a fat girl hiking.